COLUMBIA, SC — Senate budget writers voted Wednesday to restore about $70,000 in state money to two S.C. colleges, money the S.C. House voted to cut for assigning gay-themed books.

The Senate Finance Committee also voted to give legislators, in effect, a $12,000-a-year raise.

The Senate’s Finance Committee voted 11-7 to restore the money to the budgets of the University of South Carolina-Upstate and the College of Charleston.

By removing the money, critics said legislators improperly had interfered with the academic freedom of higher education institutions.

Senators said they expect the issue to be debated again when the committee’s budget proposal goes to the full Senate, expected to happen starting Tuesday.

State Sen. Mike Fair, R-Greenville, who supported the House’s decision to cut the money, said the controversy has been uncomfortable for those who support higher education.

“I’m tired of throwing rocks,” Fair said, adding he thought the universities made efforts to respond to lawmakers’ concerns.

Still, in a show-of-hands vote, Fair joined six other senators in opposing restoring the money.

Fair said if the full Senate restores the money, that decision will debated again when a joint House-Senate conference committee meets to hammer out differences between the House and Senate budget proposals for the state’s $7 billion general fund.

That debate will be an unneeded disagreement, Fair said. “We’re not going to settle this issue of nurture or nature through the budget debate.”